I’ve been trying to upgrade my HC Crusader from a mixed Roland Build, and recently acquired the full Aegis of Valor set. I don’t have quite everything I need to fully implement it as written - there’s a piece missing here and there - but I was able to principally put it together. And I immediately hit on a point that confuses me immensely.
Stone Gauntlets in the Cube. Whut? I mean… yeah, that’s some powerful defense, but without a way to negate the debuff that comes with it, it’s also absolutely crippling - to the point of being suicidal, since your super slow-mo attack-speed can leave you a sitting duck to high-damage stuff like Molten explosions. The description says that this debuff should be negated by Iron Skin and Akarat’s Champion, but since the build as written doesn’t include the Zodiac ring nor any other legendary recharge-reducer, you can’t keep those two up at all times. Heck, you can’t keep them up much more than maybe HALF the time, at best.
I’ve kinda-sorta made it work by dropping the suggested CoE for Zodiac, but even then, it’s not ideal… so what am I missing? Did I misunderstand something?
The IcyVeins build is intended for top-end GR pushing. It requires a careful manipulation of Iron Skin and Akarat’s to minimize the simultaneous downtime of both. Efficiency in this area does require skill and practice in no small amount!
If you are using the AoV build to farm, I highly recommend against that approach. Zodiac ring is a way safer option! Then load into cooldowns (including Capt. Crimson’s set bonus and your Enchantress’s lvl 20 cooldown skill). Do not spam Akarat’s in combat! Let Zodiac ring refresh it, then then keep it on standby for the remainder of the skill’s 20 sec duration. This allows other skills to refresh faster.
Once you get your cooldown sequences figured out, now you can work with the 2nd cube slot. Maybe Leoric’s (with its extra cooldown bonus) will work better for you than the Stone Gauntlets? Either way, focus on cooldowns and then, once that works for you, you can reverse engineer your way to less protective variants.
Well, it’s certainly true that I’m not really planning to do any ‘top-end GR pushing’ on HC… I just need a safe, reliable build that’ll take me to the top Torment levels, basically, so that I can farm materials and Legendary drops for other HC chars. IcyVeins builds are usually a good place to start, this one was just sufficiently esoteric in its picks to confuse me…
As for Enchantress… I kinda’ already geared up my Scoundrel? He’s kind of my default since, hey, more crits are always a good thing, and also I love his comments! Well, I guess I can switch up…
Ok, so the introduction of the term Torments into this thread opens up a whole new options window for you. If I may recommend, here is what I use for speed farming Torments, which imo, is a way more efficient method than AoV or anything tied to it:
maxroll.gg/d3planner/663871518 (can’t post working links in the forum, so you will have to paste this into a browser manually)
With Enchantress’s passive cooldown bonus, my total cooldown is 71%+. This effectively means that you can spam your skills without care. The Goldwrap in armor Kanai cube basically makes you invulnerable.
Also, I like to spam Bombardment to generate max gold and thus even more armor at all times. If you feel that that is a defensive overkill, you can swap out Goldwrap for a Krelm’s Buff Belt or other item of choice. If you must go with the Scoundrel as Hireling, then place the Belt of the Trove in your Kanai Cube and equip Vigilante Belt on your character to offset the cooldown loss.
Likewise, if you don’t care for Bombardment, pick any other skill that makes you happy (such as Judgement/Debilitate), set the rune of Iron Skin skill to Steel Skin, and drop Boyarsky’s Chip gem for something like Zei’s Stone of Vengeance, Bane of the Trapped, etc…
An LoD build? I must admit, I’ve never been partial to those… (Nor LoN, for that matter.) While I can see the charm of freeing your build from the constrictions of the established 6-piece sets, I just can’t resist the allure of those sets. The way they create a unified theme for your character’s endgame, both visually and in terms of performance.
Well, that, and there’s an inherent issue with the fact that to make an LoD build work effectively you do need to be able to push pretty high in the GR’s in order to get the gem built up to a suitable level. And also I have terrible luck when it comes to Ancient Items dropping, especially USEFUL ones.
More to the point, I basically have to work with what I’ve GOT at this juncture, as I try to climb from around T11-12 to T16 - and what I’ve got is the AoV, Roland and SotL sets. Out of those, I’m sure you’ll agree that AoV is my best bet, no? I suppose I could build something more gold-dependent, sure, but I’m still working up the Legendary Gems I’m going to need… and considering the way GR’s work, if you have a built that can take your gems up to the 50’s or thereabouts, you’ve also got a build that can handle top Torment level. Hence, I consider a gold-focused build a purely secondary priority.
I mean, if you have 6p AoV, you can just equip that, fist of the heavens, all movement speed skills and do t6. If you find a darklight, you’re already looking at t10. Add norvald’s set for t16 and khasset’s belt for easy t16.
I don’t really see how any build can be way more efficient than AoV FotH crusader for t16, considering you can already clear every rift in a minute/minute and a half average, and beyond that you’re just stuck with your movement speed being too slow, more than anything. Even with a monk, you can hardly get above the 50s~1min average rift time, and that’s assuming you have a godly monk and get good rifts.
Well, that’s pretty much what I’m going for, anyway. Though I still need the Darklight… at the moment, I’m running Fate of the Fell / Ivory Tower with Shield of Fury in the cube. Mostly just because the only SoF I had was a low-level one from early in my run. My plan is to get my hands on Darklight and a new SoF, use those, and just cube FotF…
But maybe I should go Norvald instead? Still haven’t found either piece, though. Khasset’s Belt is also missing. I’m running T12 at the moment, and could PROBABLY go higher, but on HC you always have to move a bit cautiously…
For torments you should not be playing fate of the fell, ivory tower, shield of fury etc. Just go for very fast runs (even if you have to drop to t10, t6 whatever) with pure fist of the heaven’s build.
You can make foth very tanky in t16. You have 3 cheat death, and you can wear goldwrap. And aquila. And even ancestor’s grace if you’re very very scared.
He’s kind of my default since, hey, more crits are always a good thing, and also I love his comments! Well, I guess I can switch up…